Under Cover of Night
by Pivot
Summary: Armada: Bending the rules for the sake of your sanity is all very well... unless, of course, you happen to get caught.


_Disclaimer: I own nothing! Nothing, I'm telling you! Except the chair. That's mine. Although, admittedly, it isn't in the story…_

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**Under Cover of Night**

As happened often, it was night, and in the Autobot base, it was unusually quiet. Which had to do with there having been a battle earlier, so that most of the Autobots and a good few of the Minicons were getting some well-earned rest. And Backtrack was supposed to be on monitor duty, which doubtless meant that poor Long Arm had had to take his place; since the latter had been working hard (and powerlinking) all day, there probably wasn't anyone watching the displays of darkened rooms and dimly lit hallways for activity, Decepticon or otherwise.

Whirring sounds had been heard from the Destruction Team's quarters: Buzzsaw was apparently in the mood for creation, leaving his teammates and other neighbours to try and rest through the noise. Although at least one member of the Sea Team had claimed to find the sound soothing, so perhaps it would actually help them in their quest for recharge.

Even Red Alert, celebrated insomniac that he sometimes was, had been sighted dozing (whether in his lab or his quarters, Liftor hadn't mentioned). Possibly one or two of the Space Team were still on the go, but nobody saw or heard them. Sparkplug had long since persuaded the Air Defence Team to stop running in and out of their quarters and those shared by Jolt and Nightbeat; Scavenger had not, tonight, been required to divert wandering troublemakers from their errands: as a result he was missing, presumed napping.

It was a quiet night, though not, of course, a silent one. But no chatter, clatter, crash, bang, wallop or even boom.

Which was a pretty rare occurrence, especially when the Sea Team were in the area – not to _mention_ the Destruction Team…

Nothing moved, in hallway, command centre or rec. room, though the req. room was a debatable case. But all was certainly still in the warp room.

Where systems suddenly powered up, and activated with a flash, and then all was dark again.

"Smeg, that flash mucked up my optics."

"Give 'em a moment; mine are the same."

"Anyone got a flashlight?"

There was a distinctly embarrassed pause.

"Oh, give me a break: three rescue workers, three explorers and not a single flashlight between us?"

"I had one," said a sulky voice. "I lost it in the cave with all the bats, same as Prowl's."

"Lost it? Prowl?" came a disbeliever.

"Well, not 'lost it', exactly." Prowl sounded sheepish. "More like 'dropped it'. And then Dune Runner wouldn't let me pick it up."

"Not when I saw what it's landed in," countered the now-slightly-less-sulky one. "I don't think Makeshift would have appreciated you bringing it back covered in that stuff."

"Certainly not, if you mean what I think you mean," agreed the medic in question.

"What about the rest of you?" Firebot sounded exasperated. Particularly at the universal loss of equipment. "I lost mine down a ravine," he added hastily.

"'Crevasse'," corrected Dune Runner.

"Mine fell in a snowdrift," said Iceberg.

"There was an accident with an ice patch and a rather springy bush… the word 'catapult' comes to mind…" Makeshift sounded regretful. Sounded. It was hard to be sure with Minicons, sometimes.

There was an expectant pause.

"Ransack?" prompted Iceberg. They didn't see the green Minicon's smirk in response; his teammates guessed it was there, though.

"Broke it over a goat's head," he said smugly.

There was silence.

Then Makeshift asked, "Was the goat all right?"

"I'd say so. He chewed through my tyre."

"Oh."

"Someone find the light switch," said Firebot, already moving towards the wall.

"Hold on, we have headlights…" Prowl rubbed his visor and discovered it was smeared with mud. "Urgh…"

Then the lights came on.

Six Minicons blinked owlishly up at Smokescreen with a collective flicker of their optics, thinking thoughts along the lines of '_Damn'._ They weren't, after all, supposed to leave the base without permission, never mind sneaking back in…

The Autobot chuckled and leaned back against the wall, where, in fact, he had been for some hours. "Have a good trip?"

The Minicons nodded, relaxing very slightly.

"Just like old times," said Ransack happily.

"Ransack fell off a mountain," said Prowl.

"Just like old times," repeated Dune Runner and Iceberg in unison.

"And Makeshift fell in a snowdrift," Prowl went on.

"And Iceberg pulled me out," said Makeshift.

"And Makeshift got snow on his rotors," continued the investigator.

"Which he flung at us when he tried to take off," said Dune Runner.

Firebot was frowning in a little confusion as he watched Smokescreen, who chuckled again.

"I guess you guys had better go and get some rest."

"Too true," groaned Dune Runner, visor dimming for a second. "Thanks, Smokescreen."

"'Night, Smokescreen," chirped Prowl as the group trooped out of the room.

"No problem."

"Hey, Ransack," said Iceberg as they left, "wasn't that an alpaca, not a goat?"

"No…"

When they had gone, Smokescreen didn't turn the lights back off. Producing a couple of tools and crossing the room, he went to work on a console that had made the mistake of looking dodgy earlier. After all, if anyone asked, he'd called the two teams down here to help him with a technical problem. Like with the Sea Team the night before… though how they'd managed to get so wet without _ever_ leaving the warp room was a total mystery, naturally.

And if, in the morning, Smokescreen found a picture in his quarters of six Minicons (one engaged in fending off some sort of large mammal) and a flag on top of a mountain, and if beside the picture there was a rock with melt-water pooling around it…

…Well, he didn't mention it to anybody, and that, after all, was the point.

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_Yes, more insomniac writings. With Autobots now. Bad me. I wasn't planning it, either. The whole thing came about as the result of some thought on one of Armada's greatest questions…_

…_No, not 'where does Rollbar keep his energon stash?' I mean 'why is Smokescreen called Smokescreen?' Once I had a sort of answer, of course, the Minicons jumped in and hijacked it. It happens a lot._

_And now I must go install tripwires and things to stop Autobots wandering into my head during the early hours of the morning, then tell Smokescreen to stop covering for people. In the unlikely event that you feel like reviewing, please do so…_


End file.
